Two Households
by Cat 2
Summary: An Alternate and less tragic version of Baz Luhrmann Romeo Juilet, starting from Mercutis injury by Tybalt. this is my first attempt at a Shakespeare Fan fic, so please R
1. Chapter 1

Author's note: the story and characters are not mine. They belong to Mr. Shakespeare. The inspiration for this story was the Wonderful 1996 Baz Luhrmann's _Romeo + Juliet__, _possibly the best adaptation and is set in that World of Verona Beach. I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this, but would be grateful for thoughts and ideas. It's not in the language, because quite frankly I lack the time and energy to put it in Shakespeare's English. It is an alternate ending, mainly because every time I watch the film, while I love it, I end up screaming at the TV. So this is how I think it should run. Hope you like it.

Prologue

"In other cities women pray for sun. Here in Verona, we pray for rain."

These thought, a saying of my mother rattle through my head, as I sit beside my cousins bed. Outside a huge storm rages. They say it's the worst in memory. Outside the hospital room, an even bigger one rages.

We've gathered in here, the younger generation, partly by common consent and partly because of the hospital lying outside Verona's walls, and having no idea of the feud.

Benvolio and I sit by Romeo's bed. He'll be alright, just a concussion and a flesh wound to the arm, or so the doctors tell us. They're right. I checked.

Tybalt lies in his bed alone. Initially the Caplets' gathered around it, but the nurse threw the elders out, and Juliet now sits nervously on a chair in the middle.

Valentino sits next to Mercutio's bed. He keeps talking to him in Italian, trying to get some response, but his big brother is still out cold from the surgeon's drugs. He was lucky. They removed the bullet and pumped him full of blood. He may now live.

"They seem to be getting quieter," Valentino observes hopefully in Italian.

"Just pausing for breath." I reply in the same language, "Or else the prince's men have arrived to stop them."

"Too quiet for that!" Benvolio observes and we all laugh. Juliet regards us, confused and I wander again at Balthazar's feverish accusation of a few moments ago. How could Romeo marry a girl, who is not only a Capulet, but outside his own culture?

"Is it true?" Valentino is probably the only one of us bold, or stupid, enough to ask the question. "What Balthazar said. Is it the truth?"  
She ducks her head and nods nervously. Slowly Benvolio rises to his feet.

"Then you'd best take my seat."

She moves quickly and timidly to sit in his vacated seat. I cannot honestly say that I blame her. We are none of us sure what to make of this. Silence again reigns in the 

small room, broken only by the rumble of thunder outside, and the louder rumble within.

After about an hour, Valentino, no longer able to just sit there leave. He returns with food, that we are all grateful for, despite none of us been truly hungry.

He places the food, readymade pasta salad, in the centre of the hospital table, in an age old tradition to show he means no ill will. He cannot tell who will take which, so he cannot poison them. Not that anyone of us would suspect him.

We take them and eat while we listen to the quarrel. They have moved beyond the nature of the Balthazar's accusations and, the exchanges of personal insults, to every death in the quarrel within the last thirty or so years. Suddenly we can hear the thunder.

Captain **Escalus** Prince storms into the room.

"Right!" he says staring around the room. "Who wants to tell me what happened here?"

The explanation takes some hours. I can't really help; I don't know how the quarrel started, beyond the usual of Montague vs. Capulet. I didn't know anything about the marriage till this morning. I knew that Benvolio, Mercutio, Romeo and the others had crashed the Capulet's party, but I think its best not to mention that.

All I know about is how we got here. I was the only one in the house when the call came. I was the one the High Way agency told.

How in pursuit of Tybalt Romeo had left the jurisdiction of Verona Beach. How Tybalt's car had been upturned, and Romeo trying to help (at least that was what they thought and I wasn't going to contradict them) had swerved to avoid a collision with another car, and been injured.

Two seconds later, literally as I hung up the phone, Benvolio burst in with news of the quarrel.

The Fates had smiled on us, for the hospital, to which good Mercutio had been taken, by helicopter, was the same one to which they had taken Romeo. So here we are.

The others tell their parts, only Valentino is silent. I suppose like me he's got nothing to say.

Prince takes it all in his stride. In terms of the quarrel, he's heard it all before. And with the marriage, unlike Father Lawrence, he sees the risks to both. Which is probably why he says he will take Juliet to father's house, then to the station. He knows only too well that there is still the chance that her father will kill her to protect family honor. Or her mother.

Benvolio leaves too, to fetch some clean clothes for the three of us from home. That just leaves me, and Valentino, and the wounded of course.

After about 3 hours, I get up. I need to stretch my legs, and a faint calmness has descended upon the wing. I walk to the vending machine and buy myself a soda.

It occurs to me that Valentino has been here as long as I have, and might appreciate some refreshment, so I wander back to find out.

What I see there makes me feel ill.


	2. Chapter 2

_author's note: A reviewer reminded me I forgot to introduce my narrator. she is _Bianca, _Benvolio's sister, and she is the only character i own, so ask if you want to borrow her. Please Review._

Chapter 1

"There is no chance that this was a natural death?" Captain Escalus Prince asked, looking at the doctor who stood opposite him.

The man shook his head.

"Tybalt's condition was stable. There was no chance that he would have succumbed this fast."

Prince shook his head.  
"they should never have put them in together." He muttered.

"sir?" the man, a doctor from the hospital looks confused. Prince shook his head.

" a private matter." He said. Sighing, he got to his feet and wandered over to the tiny window of his office. "who else have you told of this?"  
the man blinks. "no one."  
"good." The captain's face was grim. "let's keep it that way."

Noticing the confusion on the doctor's face he said, "there has been nearly a week with no trouble from either household. If this gets out, we'll be lucky if we have a riot on our hands."

The doctor's blinked, surprised by the intensity in the man's face. He had hear, everyone had, of the rivalry between the two households in Verona beach, but had never thought it was this bad.

"I will tell no one." He promised. The captain dismissed him with a wave of his hand.

"see that you do." He replied. Leaning forward he pushed the intercom button.  
"Sergeant the priest who was driving the car, when the injuries occurred?"  
"yes sir."

"bring him here."

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_Someone is shaking me. I push their hands away, opening my eyes. Valentino's chocolate face stares back at me. His eyes are overly bright, like a man with a fever._

_"ill met by moonlight proud Titania's." He says, using Mercutio's old nickname for me. It makes me feel ill._

_"don't call me that" I reply, sitting up and rubbing my eyes. "and it's not…"I stop and screw my eyes up at the suddenly flush of light.. The lights of the hospital beat down on the orange chair where I've been lying. The sky that shows though the dust smeared window is dark._

_"I guess I was more tired than I thought." I mutter, sure that it was light when I came hence. Benvolio's face comes into view as my eyes adjust. My brother looks like death hath marked him for his own._

_"they've thrown us out. " he says jerking his head in the direction of the hospital room. "do you have any idea why they'd do that?"_

_I open my mouth to reply, but then I catch sight of Valentino._

_"none." I reply softly._

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"But surely the boy's family must be informed?" Friar Jonathon David gazed confused at the Police chief who had summoned him to this office. The captain's face creased into what might have been a smile.

"Father how long have you been in this city?"  
"Including the accident? About 2 hours."

The captain smiled, rather sadly. "Three Civil brawls in the last 3 months bred of an airy word by Capulet or Montague."

The Friar nodded, slowly.

"Why me?" he asked, eventually. "I'm not a cop, I have no training…"  
Captain Prince did not reply directly. Instead he walked over to his office window and gazed out across the city.

"In Verona beach," he said, "you're either a Montague or a Capulet. You either speak Italian or English as your first language. You either hang around the Globe and the old theater, the Rose, or the beach. There is no in-between and very little neutral ground. My men all have alliances to one or other households. I have alliances to both."

Noticing the surprise on the friar's face, he smiled slightly.

"Tybalt is my nephew, my younger sister's son. Mercutio is my cousin, Romeo is my nephew, his mother was my elder sister. Both half's," he added, as though he had seen the confusion on the young man's face. "my father was white."  
he wander over to the desk.

"you will see things that I won't, because I can not help been involved. They will tell you things that they would not tell me. Partly because you are a priest and partly because they do not know you."

He stood, leaning over the leather chair in which the black haired, tousled young man sat.

"you told Father Lawrence you came here because you wanted to help."  
Friar John nodded.

"then how can you say no?"

"where do we start?"

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_Benivilo knows something is up. He keeps looking at me as we drive back, as I lie curled up in the passenger seat. But then he changes his mind and focuses back on the road._

_Eventually the silence and the unasked questions are more than I can bear._

_"can you stop here?" I ask, startling him. Since we left the hospital I haven't' said a word. He's surprised enough to pull over._

_"why?" he demands, uncertain._

_I'm fiddling with my seat belt, so I don't have to look at him._

_"I'm going to mass."_


End file.
